Chargers Set to Move to L.A., Say Insiders

The San Diego Chargers, the Oakland Raiders and the St. Louis Rams are all making moves to take on the vacant Los Angeles NFL football team market–and experts and insiders have been saying Chargers owner Dean Spanos is dedicated to the L.A. move.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said the league has been looking for a “long term” plan for success in Los Angeles and “that’s why we spent the last two decades trying to come up with a solution that we felt would provide that kind of foundation,” the San Jose Mercury Newsreported.

Los Angeles has been without an NFL team since the Raiders and Rams left in 1994. L.A. was home to the Rams for 49 years. The Raiders spent 14 years in L.A. before returning to Oakland. The Chargers have been in San Diego for over 50 years, spending only their first year in L.A.

Three teams and at least three separate stadium proposals are at stake in these negotiations.

The Chargers and Raiders have joined forces with a joint $1.7 billion stadium proposal for the L.A. area city of Carson. The project quickly breezed through city and environmental approvals.

The Rams have proposed a nearby Inglewood stadium at a proposed cost of $1.86 billion, based on an estimate available earlier this year.

And then there’s the city of San Diego’s proposal to keep the Chargers with a $1.1 billion stadium project. The Mercury News reported that revised plans were released Monday as the city made a presentation to the NFL committee on Los Angeles Opportunities.

Former 49ers executive Carmen Policy, brought in to assist with the Raiders-Chargers project, said the two teams are best bets, as they were born and bred in California, the Mercury reported. Policy told NBC San Diego that the Raiders-Chargers project would make L.A. a “mega-market.”

Typically the relocation application window is January 1 through February 15, but Goodell has indicated that timeline could potentially be moved up. Relocation fees could be decided as early as the fall.